[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 140 (Friday, September 30, 1994)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: September 30, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                      HUMAN RIGHTS ABUSES IN IRAN

                                 ______


                            HON. DAN BURTON

                               of indiana

                    in the house of representatives

                       Friday, September 30, 1994

  Mr. BURTON of Indiana. Mr. Speaker, the government of Iran continues 
to grossly violate human rights and to promote terrorism around the 
world. Their reprehensible conduct is a perversion of the noble ideals 
of Islam.
  Last week, several of my colleagues held a press conference to call 
upon the State Department to hold a dialog with the People's Mujahedin 
of Iran. Such a dialog very clearly represents the will of the 
Congress. It makes no sense at all to ignore a very important 
opposition movement in Iran which is fighting against a tyrannical, 
evil regime.
  I commend to my colleagues this excellent editorial from the New York 
Times of September 26, 1994, which expresses the views of many Members 
of Congress on this important matter.

               [From the New York Times, Sept. 26, 1994]

                      Listen to All Iranian Voices

       In dealing with a dictatorship, it is simple prudence to 
     listen to its critics. This has not been U.S. policy in 
     dealing with Iran's clerical tyranny. The State Department 
     has shunned all contact with a key opposition group, the 
     People's Mujahedeen, which also happens to be the group most 
     loudly denounced by Iran. Bothered by this boycott, Congress 
     last year instructed the Administration to prepare an 
     objective written report on all the Iranian opposition 
     groups.
       Yet the State Department still refuses any contact with the 
     People's Mujahedeen, a stance protested the other day by a 
     flock of U.S. senators and nearly a hundred representatives. 
     Indeed, it is hard to see how any study can be complete as 
     long as the State Department studiously ignores one important 
     component of the Iranian opposition.
       More specifically, the State Department should at least 
     give the group a chance to answer the charges that have made 
     it so controversial and, apparently, so unpopular among U.S. 
     foreign policymakers. Among these charges are that, in years 
     past, the group was responsible for killing Americans, and 
     that today it obtains help and protection from Saddam 
     Hussein's Iraqi dictatorship.
       Some facts are not in dispute. The People's Majahedeen and 
     its leader, Massoud Rajavi, were part of the radical 
     coalition that ousted the Shah of Iran in 1979; only later 
     did these generally secular revolutionaries break with the 
     ayatollahs. It is also a fact that this group has resorted to 
     armed rebellion; its insurgents have struck across frontiers 
     from bases in northern Iraq. But its ubiquitous 
     representatives claim their movement is democratic, that it 
     long ago shed its anti-Americanism and that it has helped to 
     galvanize a global campaign against human rights offenses 
     within Iran.
       One can doubt any or all of these claims and still be 
     troubled by the State Department's closed ears. It is 
     especially distasteful that this boycott is treated as a 
     victory by Iranian mullahs, who urge other states to have no 
     contacts with Mr. Rajavi's ``terrorists.'' This comes with 
     special impudence from clergymen who clamor for the death of 
     the novelist Salman Rushdie, who are plausibly linked with 
     the murder of Iranian dissidents in France, Switzerland, 
     Turkey and elsewhere, and whose agents are believed to have 
     assailed Mr. Rushdie's translators and publishers in Japan, 
     Italy and Norway.
       Speaking in Chicago last month to the annual convention of 
     B'nai B'rith, President Clinton called the Iranian regime 
     ``the world's leading sponsor of state-sponsored terrorism.'' 
     So long as Teheran continues to export death squads, and 
     exhorts its followers to kill a foreigner for writing a book, 
     it cannot in decency ask Washington to avoid contacts with 
     ``terrorists.'' Iran's own record needs to be taken into 
     account if the Administration is to be truly objective in 
     judging the Iranian opposition.

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